Alternatives to Calibre Companion?

[MarjaE]

Can anyone recommend alternatives to Calibre Companion?

Perhaps one which can organize books into folders?

[Prospero2021]

Alfa Ebooks Manager
https://www.alfaebooks.com/

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Prospero2021

Alfa Ebooks Manager
https://www.alfaebooks.com/

Sorry, but you got it wrong. Calibre Companion is an eBook organizer for iOS and Android. It's not Calibre. And what you linked is not a Calibre replacement.

[Whallup]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Sorry, but you got it wrong. Calibre Companion is an eBook organizer for iOS and Android. It's not Calibre. And what you linked is not a Calibre replacement.

They were looking for something to help organize their books, I would say Alfa eBooks Manager is exactly that.

I am not sure what they offer in the department of an android application, but I am sure if they do it is a million times better than Calibre Companion (though I personally like the desktop Calibre app over Alfa, companion is one of the more terrible applications I have ever used).

[Deskisamess]

Alfa only runs on PC's, costs $30 I think, and updates aren't free. There is NO info about the company behind it, and no reviews that potential users can read.

No way I would install something like that on my computer.

And it's amazing how many times it's been trotted out here lately, from brand new members.

[Whallup]

Originally Posted by Deskisamess

Alfa only runs on PC's, costs $30 I think, and updates aren't free. There is NO info about the company behind it, and no reviews that potential users can read.

No way I would install something like that on my computer.

And it's amazing how many times it's been trotted out here lately, from brand new members.

Open source is always better which is why I use Calibre. I agree with you when it comes to concerns using closed software. Though as a windows user who doesn't mind paying for software and updates Alfa is still an alternative when it comes to the function of the program. One could also argue that having a profitable piece of software, and open source don't go hand in hand, both have pros and cons (though I always fall more into the open source / donation camp).

While it is an alternative, I agree it is not a very good one - and when I tried it before it did not handle a large library very well at all. It does however let you set up your book organization/folder structure however you wish (though that could be the cause of the performance issues).


I also have to say CC is growing on me in the past 24 hours because it's actually working as long as I transfer my library in small batches, I just feel the program is a bit lack luster on features and design.

[skillachie]

Originally Posted by MarjaE

Can anyone recommend alternatives to Calibre Companion?

Perhaps one which can organize books into folders?

BookFusion is a good alternative to Calibre Companion since you can use BookFusion to only organize and manage your eBook collection while downloading the files to be used with another reader OR you can also read your eBooks with the BookFusion across Web, Android and iOS devices with our apps. All your reading progress, highlights, notes and bookmarks will always be synced.

[snow-raven]

I use GoodReader to do exactly as you describe. It gives a lot of flexibility in how you manage sync records, including being able to store the synced files in different folders from where they’re arranged in the Calibre folder structure. It also happens to be my favorite eReader for reference documents or anything I might want to mark up.
I still use Calibre Companion as my interface for finding the reference I’m looking for, as I like to be able to search by tag, etc. But once I identify the text I want, I just open it in GoodReader via the author-named folder in my library.

[Whallup]

Originally Posted by snow-raven

I use GoodReader to do exactly as you describe. It gives a lot of flexibility in how you manage sync records, including being able to store the synced files in different folders from where they’re arranged in the Calibre folder structure. It also happens to be my favorite eReader for reference documents or anything I might want to mark up.
I still use Calibre Companion as my interface for finding the reference I’m looking for, as I like to be able to search by tag, etc. But once I identify the text I want, I just open it in GoodReader via the author-named folder in my library.

just to add to this, GoodRead is not available for android

[skillachie]

Originally Posted by Whallup

just to add to this, GoodRead is not available for android

It can be found at https://play.google.com/store/apps/d...hl=en_US&gl=US

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by snow-raven

I use GoodReader to do exactly as you describe.

And you are sharing all the info with Amazon, without even being paid.

[snow-raven]

Originally Posted by Quoth

And you are sharing all the info with Amazon, without even being paid.

Not the same app, my corvidian friend (and other commenters). You can tell as GoodReader works quite well and continues to be improved & developed as the years go by, so it's clearly not the fun little "which books have I read and liked" app that Amazon bought and then left by the side of the road to die (AKA GoodReads). GoodReads also isn't any sort of alternative to Calibre Companion, which is what the OP was asking for.

GoodReader does appear to be platform limited, but if you're looking for an iOS solution, you can learn more here: https://www.goodreader.com/. It happens to be one of the few remaining apps with a one-time purchase paid option, rather than a never-ending subscription cost, which is something I value. I didn't come here to proselytize, but since there was conflicting info based on my post, I felt compelled to add my full assessment.

[Faterson]

I really loved using GoodReader for years (despite its severe limitation of being iOS-only), but I had to abandon it and settle for dumb Acrobat Reader.

The reason is GoodReader's totally non-standard way of syncing files, at least with Dropbox.

What GoodReader does, whenever you sync a file with Dropbox, is that it first deletes the previous version of that book file in Dropbox, and then it immediately uploads the updated version of the book.

You might think that that's fine, but it's definitely not. Even though the book file is missing for only a split second on Dropbox, this is enough to destroy the file's version history in Dropbox. For Dropbox, it's a completely new file every time (even though it has the same file name), and version history for book files can't be recovered at all.

I tried to resolve this with both Dropbox and GoodReader tech support, but it's definitely a GoodReader issue. There is no such problem with syncing to Dropbox via Acrobat Reader, for example.

Acrobat Reader really only uploads an updated version of the original file, just like it should. GoodReader should learn to sync files with Dropbox in this standard way as well.

Unfortunately, the reply from GoodReader tech support was that they're unable to do anything about this currently. So, I had to stop using GoodReader.